Obama is making his list and checking it twice. First, it was health care and now it is education. I am always happy when Washington starts talking about education reform, but the happiness is always mixed with a dose of apprehension. I know that the people who are making decisions about education, have no idea what really goes on in classrooms. Go read just a few pages of Bush's failed No Child Left Behind and you will see exactly what I mean.
What is Obama proposing? He would like to see little to no summer vacation and longer school days. I see where he is going with this, but we've tried year round school and it lasted about a year. I am sure that there is a way to make it work, but you'd have to get the football coaches on board. Summer vacation has long been blamed as the reason our schools are failing. Some say that the 3 months kids are off of school are a waste of time. I agree! When I was a teacher, we spent at least the first 6 weeks reviewing. However, everything in our country revolves around the September to June calendar. I think this will be the cause of the majority of the resistance.
The article says that kids here spend 1,146 instructional hours, which comes out to 6.36 hours per day. Not true. They are at school for 7 hours and they might get 3 hours of instructional time. That would be only 540 hours! Longer school days aren't going to produce the results they are after. Kids can only take in so much and if they go longer, than that would mean a few more breaks. So, if you add 3 hours, then that would really only add about 1.5 hours of instructional time. Schools would have to pay for the maintenance costs and the salaries of teachers would have to reflect the extra time. I am in support of P.E., music and art, but really what do our kids learn in these classes?
The real problem plaguing our school system is the money that is attached to standardized tests. There is so much emphasis on these tests that the teachers only teach the test, which in my opinion test nothing.
I think Obama and his staff are on the right track as far as knowing that the system is severely broken. But, if we are going to look at other nations to see what they are doing, look at their entire system and see what is working and what is different.
Sure, they go to school longer, but what do the learn, how is taught and how is it assessed?More School: Obama would curtail summer vacation
1 comments:
I currently live in another country and personally, longer school days suck. lol. I live in S. Korea where they push kids to learn from a very early age. Kids never have time to play or hang out unless they are up very late at night. The kids are always very tired in the middle of the day because when they get home all they have is homework and they never get to sleep. I've also notice that they really aren't that much smarter considering all of their effort. I was actually kind of surprised. Yes, they learn a lot of things, but their brains can't retain it all because they are pushed all day long. I think it's really sad, it's even happening to 3-4 year olds. Kids need time to be kids in my opinion.
Post a Comment